Dear Life

Dear Life,
Please send grapes.
Sincerely, I prefer wine over lemonade

I seem to apologize every other post for not getting around to blogging often enough. I know many of you would like updates on my daily life, but I've been hit pretty hard lately and if I take to writing it out here, I think I may be a bit too specific. I am trying to have this blog be a place that is safe from my struggles, although maybe it shouldn't be? I don't know yet. Still deciding on that one. However, as it stands now, that's what this site is and that's what I'd like to jump into today: life's little things that make me smile and be carefree, even for an hour.

There are only certain things that make my heart swell with happiness: small propeller planes, Frank Sinatra, and anything retro (among other things). I also truly love only three sports: baseball, gymnastics and volleyball. Baseball has been a part of me since I was little, particularly the NY Mets (I still believe!). They won their infamous - most recent - World Series over the Boston Red Sox in 1986, the year I was born. I spent my 21st birthday at their home opener and my whole immediate family went to the first game at Citi Field in 2009. My grandfather had brought my dad to the first ever Mets game at Shea Stadium back in 1964 and sadly passed away just a few short months after their World Series victory in 1969. Ever since then, baseball has been a "thing" for the Petrone clan and we can't eat, breath and sleep enough of it the whole summer long.

Gymnastics is my personal passion. I wish I had had the talent and determination to see it through as far as I could go, but the Lord had other plans. I am not bitter, however, because it has lead me to where I am today and I would not trade movie nights with my youth group or my college experience with my best friends for anything. I would have missed all that and more if I had gone for it. But it still remains something I must participate in to this day. I coached all throughout college and I will sit down and watch a college competition on television for an entire Saturday afternoon. Sometimes, I want to just stop in a gym in order to smell the chalk and pound on the spring floor. It has hypnotized me for life.

Volleyball became a passion later in life, working my skill in later high school and ending up on my college team for the first two years. Something about pounding the living daylights out of a ball, sailing it straight down an opponents throat is just so satisfying. I wasn't too much of a hitter, however, and since my height lends to being a digger I worked on my libero talents instead. When you make that amazing dig with a flat hand against the ground, or dig up your knee to save a great spike from the other team, it's just so worth it. So since I love this sport and this past Monday in Boston was extremely warm, a few of my house mates and I went to our local beach to play some beach volleyball. First let me say that beach volleyball is so much harder than regular volleyball. Gee whiz! I was panting two minutes into warm up. But it was lovely to feel my breath going in and out and inhaling that warm salt air. My toes touched sand for the first time this year and let me just say, I need to get my summer feet back. We played well into the evening and really got into a serious two-on-two game. I think I must have swallowed half the beach. My serve needs a bit of practice again and the wind didn't seem to want to play along, but we had fun. And I smiled. Really smiled.

Not me, but it could be.

This is actually the nicest it could look... it's a city beach after all.

Once the sun began to set around 7:30, we took our cue to get some soft serve ice cream at Sullivan's on Castle Island. It seemed so 1950's, so retro. So of course I loved it. Sullivan's has been around since about that decade and the prices still remains low. You can get your fill of hot dogs, hamburgers, French fries, fried dough and soft serve ice cream until your blue in the face. Once you've chatted with the friendly woman with the ginormous dog (it's called a white golden retriever) and laughed at the people who still think its 1990 and roller blade, you can take a quick walk up to Fort Independence, which we did. If you sit on the side opposite the ocean you have a fabulous view of the huge jets taking off from Logan airport. They come right at you and fly directly over your head. It's a little scary but it's a sight to see.

So although Monday's are usually a drag, I relished this past one. It was a slight taste of summer and the joy that warm weather brings. Keep it up, Mother Nature!